“Sugar, Sugar”
To date, the Archies are the only fictional band to ever top Billboard’s year-end pop chart, as . Perhaps that will change in the future when we consume holographic pop stars in virtual reality, but for now, the record belongs to A
The Archies , comprised by members, Archie, Jughead, Reggie, Betty, and Veronica, were the group that performed on a Saturday morning cartoon Archie. The group itself was never seen, just the cartoon characters. In 1969, the group popularized “Sugar, Sugar” which became the top-selling song in America. According to Jeff Barry, he and Andy Kim came into the idea of creating a song that would features preschoolers since that was the audience for the Archie TV show . Interestingly, Barry had children aged 3 and 4 at the time. The line ,“You are my candy girl” came from them thinking about what kids that age like. And the answer for that question is candy.
Still, they wanted the song to appeal to adults as well, so they included a line with some weight:
“I just can’t believe the loveliness of loving you.”
The Archies
A degree of mystery surrounded the identity of The Archies as this song rose up the charts.
Says Wine, “It was a secret who we were. In fact, the New Year’s Eve countdown of trivia, for years one of the questions would be ‘What group never appeared together, never went on the road together, never interviewed together, as the group, and had a #1 song?’ and people wouldn’t get it. It was hilarious. But Ronnie and I, in the last few years we’ve actually done three performances as The Archies.
We didn’t do it for 30-some-odd years, but in the last three years we did for the MDA, the Jerry Lewis Telethon, which of course Tony Orlando hosts out of New York, and has been hosting since day one. It was very, very cool. We also did it when I did a one-woman show at Genghis Cohen in West Hollywood. And then about a month ago (2007) we did a special part for David Gest. And we did it there. It was a hoot.”
Tags
Jeff Barry, Sugar Sugar, The Archies